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Teacher With Sex-Worker Past Resigns

By Sharon Otterman January 21, 2011 6:16 pmJanuary 21, 2011 6:16 pm

Melissa Petro, the elementary school art teacher who was brought up on charges by the city for writing openly about her past as a sex worker, has agreed to resign rather than face a hearing that could lead to her dismissal, the city announced Friday.

Ms. Petro has been on administrative leave since late September, when an essay she wrote on the Huffington Post about how she had sold her sexual services ended up making headlines in the New York Post. Once on leave, which consisted, she said, of sitting at a cubicle in downtown Brooklyn doing nothing, she defended her right to write about her past.

“I have no regrets and have done nothing I’m ashamed of,” she wrote in December, also on the Huffington Post. “I have worked hard to become the woman I am today — a woman of dignity and grace, not to mention a competent teacher as well as an accomplished writer.”

Ms. Petro, 31, has admitted that she exchanged sexual services for cash through posts on Craigslist between October 2006 and Jan. 2007. She has said her sex work ended several months before she became a teacher at P.S. 70 in the Bronx. She will remain on the payroll until the end of April. And she has agreed to never seek employment in the city public schools ever again.

Didn’t all that hard work and earned competency reveal to her that prostitution and teaching children in a public school do not fit? Seems to me her “sex worker” cheap mentality still dominates her character, despite all her “higher” accomplishments.

Everyone has done things they are proud of and many things they are not. Like it our not those not so good things are part of who we are – our history – and it is useless and unhealthy to deny the past. We just move on and try to be better persons.

It seems to me to be a basic right – constitutional or otherwise – to acknowledge ones past and write about it and it really is none of the School systems business unless Ms Petro was guilty of falsifying her application for the job.

What we see at work here is not high standards – no one ever accused the NYC school system of high standards – its politicians and their appointees running for cover.

In a city where the mayor thinks he has the right to tell everyone what to eat small wonder his minions feel free to tell someone how to write their autobiography.

Sex is not a crime. Just about every type of professional from clergy to politician, from lawyers to married father and everyone in between. Even females who want to fulfill a fantasy have paid for sex.
As long as sexual practices are conducted in a safe, consensual manner, I don’t feel theres is problem.
The fact this ex-sex worker decided to educated herself, became a competent teacher show nothing but postive strengths and should not have any negative impact of her current vocation as a teacher. Sex worker have always and will always draw those seeking a sexual thrill and is by know means a reason to terminate this teacher.
This reminds me of the Elliot Spitzer scandal. He dismantled brothels but continued to sleep with sex workers after taking legal action against them.
My point is that several of those in the board of ed that took action against her are just the same that source out prostitutes services.
I’d rather a teacher who was a prostitute teach my child then a closeted priest with pent up sexual energy teach my child.
You know the outcome of that situation.

The woman has “No Shame” therefore, in this regard, she is just like millions of her fellow Americans in this cesspool society where rampant crime fueled by illegal drugs, overcrowded prisons and easy access to internet pornography has turned us into a hypocritical laughing stock around the globe!

One thing for sure, if this educator was able to keep her students quiet ( the most important ingredient administrators look at in evaluating teachers) during her classes, she will be sorely missed by her bosses!

I don”t se why she is not a good teacher .
If we had to discriminate all the public employees on the base of what we like or don”t about sexual behaviours ….
There is no end to it.
Talking about one”s own sex life is not a crime for god sake.

So somebody who has moved on in her life and finally found her niche, her meaning is to be denied the opportunity to fulfil that because of what she did in her past? Or is there a statute of limitations on “bad” behaviour?

She’s a well liked, respected and necessary (in that there are too few art teachers in these days of sci-tech curricula) teacher.

Shame on the self righteous school authorities for passing judgement and not giving our kids a real chance to learn from someone who really cares.

The only writing offers she has gotten in her life stem solely from her writing about the contrast of being a sex worker (very briefly) and a teacher. Otherwise she would be writing to herself solely for herself (okay, maybe some friends and relatives as well).

She wanted the publicity as a writer; she must have known the inherent risks when she submitted her writing for public view. Maybe the exposure and loss of her teaching job has been worth it to her. Only she knows.

Was the teacher in question a competent yeacher? The answer is apparently “yes”. Was she a dedicated teacher? The answer is apparently “yes, too. Did she act in any way that was inappropriate with students or colleagues? The answer to that is “No” In this case, the school system really had no business meddling in her private life and firing her – It’s not as if teachers don’t go to bars and allow themselves to be picked up there. The NYC school system is engaging in holier-than-thou hipocrisy. At tax[ayer expense. Apparently, there is a bunch of underemployed bureaucrats in the NYC school system who are looking for something to do. They ned to be fired.

Whatever your take on the ethics of her past activities, Ms Petro is a walking, talking monument to appalling judgment. There is a concept floating around in web land that says if you write something and post it, no one can say anything about it, let alone have a negative reaction to it. It goes along with the notion that writing something controversial is in itself an act of bravery that should protect you from repercussions.

How did she describe herself? Dignity, grace, and an accomplished writer?

Ah yes. Thanks so much to all those who’ve promoted self-esteem over reality for the past several decades.

I don’t think anyone has aright to judge her like this. Her past has nothing to do with her present. If you keep telling people who are trying to tear of the mould that circumstances pushed on them that they have no right to living a normal life then i can only think it a shame that you forget the past wrongs done to women by our collective mindsets. I think this women is a hero for being able to get out of that past and embrace a better future for her children. I would be proud of her as a teacher and a mom and would fight anyone who thought otherwise. When Christians had it right was the time when the cathars preached the gospel along with their women and it was their own people who hunted them down and killed them all to extinction. That was women’s right to have equal status as men. Today it is sad that even though women have the ability to empathize with men. It s more of a gloat then a means of bettering inter-gender understanding. I believe that she should have been used as an inspiration rather than an example of an intolerant and backward society.

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